Over the weekend James Holzhauer the recent most exciting champion on Jeopardy!, sent out a tweet that many think had a cryptic meaning. He tweeted something about Andrew Luck, the pro quarterback who has opted for early retirement. Holzhauer tweeted something like it must be sorrowful to reach the pinnacle of one's career and find it isn't that satisfying. The Jeopardy! conspiracy theorists read into the tweet to think Holzhauer is talking about himself and that he through his 32 day run on purpose, making Emma Boettcher the most hated Jeopardy Champion ever.
None of the theory is true. First of all Holzhauer is a competitive guy and would never through a game on purpose. Secondly he was one more game away from breaking Ken Jennings regular season winnings record in half the time. Holzhauer made roughly 2.5 million and was only $58,484 behind the Jennings record. No way was he willing to stop at that point.
Here's what actually happened. First of all Emma had also read the book about using the buzzer and therefore became a quick with it as Holzhauer was. So James as reigning champion and he started off the round. He always started on the bottom of the board and when he took his pick it was the Daily Double. Bad Luck. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. He couldn't make any money on a Daily Double. This was a huge set-back. So he went on to get through the round ahead of Emma but she kept pace because her buzzer skills were equal to his.
In the second round James was gaining a nice lead but then Emma got the first Daily Double. Another set back. My heart began to sink. This caused Emma to go outside of her playing sense [as evidenced by her following two days play], and she had to bet much much bigger than she ever wanted to. She got within striking distance. Play continued and James played well but I could tell he was becoming more down by his luck this show. And then as they continued to go, the crushing blow fell. She got the other Daily Double. She bet bigger than she would like and was ahead, and there wasn't enough money left on the board to James get the lead back before the end of Double Jeopardy.
Final Jeopardy began with James having a total of $23,400, Emma with $26,600. I had to ignore the third player, but he wasn't in this match really. Final Jeopardy Category - Shakespearean Literature. So here was the Final Jeopardy clue: "The line 'a great reckoning in a little room' in 'As You Like It' is usually taken to refer to this author's premature death."
The answer/question was "Who was Christopher Marlowe?" The third player got it right. And so did James, but he wagered a mere $1,399 bringing his total to $24,799. The crowd gasped. Emma also got it right [as would any person who has ever seen the film Shakespeare In Love], and as James would later say he predicted, she wagered $20,201 ensuring that she could beat an all in wager by Holzhauer. She wins easily.
This was a classic case of just bad luck. From the picking the Daily Double right off the bat, to her getting both Daily Doubles in the second round, and her betting big when she didn't want to, and her having read the most effective way to use the buzzer on and on. Just good luck for her, bad luck for Jimmy. Had James been able to run the bottom row before hitting the Daily Double, Emma would never have caught him.
This was not James tossing the match. As much as I and everyone else in the country hated it and that Chicago Librarian, he just ran into a rash of bad luck. As far as I was concerned everyone in the country that knew who Shakespeare was and had at least seen the aforementioned movie.
After all, he did say that in the course of his day job - professional sports gambler - he had lost $25,000 once.
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